Suffering in silence

Mariana De Maio
Adelante Assistant Editor

ALSO Law offers help to victims The cycle of violence [GRAPHIC 109 K] Political asylum for victims is under scrutiny WHAT YOU CAN DO : if you are a victim; if you are and advocate; if you are a concerned citizen. www.adelanteonline.com

Alicia came to the United States thinking that her life would change — that he would change. But instead, she found herself isolated in a new culture, with a new language. It was as if she were trapped in a dark room.
The darkness started to dimi-nish the day she took her son to the clinic. The doctor looked at her and knew. “Every day he would send me a letter requesting an appointment to see him,” Alicia recalls.
He was the first one to tell Alicia that what her husband was doing was against the law. Alicia was afraid of her husband going to jail. She imagined the day that he would get out, take her children away and kill her.
The doctor accepted that she needed time. But he gave her a letter, which she still keeps, to show to the police in case she would need a witness. He also sent a social worker to her house to offer her help.

“He left me bathed in my own blood.” — Alicia, victim of domestic violence www.adelanteonline.com

That was 1995 — 13 years after her nightmare began. That was Alicia’s first real opportunity to break free.
Alicia’s story mirrors those of many immigrant women. Those dark rooms cage them. The women hit one wall when they try to tell someone their secret, but no one understands. They hit another when they consider calling the police, but terrified of being deported, they stop themselves. And yet another wall confines them with shame and guilt for their partner’s abuse.
When Alicia got married at age 14 in rural Chihuahua, Mexico, she was a stranger to abuse. Rafael, her husband, was only a year older, but unlike Alicia, he had grown up in a violent household.
Even the smallest thing warranted a beating. She was always to blame. She was lazy. She didn’t open the door fast enough. She looked at him in a way that he didn’t like.
Then, one day he came home with a different attitude, and she thought this time he had changed. Alicia was pregnant and had three girls; he proposed to move the whole family to the United States. Alicia accepted.
Her son was born in the States, but despite her hopes, nothing changed. The beatings continued.
“He left me bathed in my own blood,” she says softly, detached, as though she is describing the story of another woman.
But where could she turn?
Escape from domestic abuse is an excruciatingly difficult process for anyone. But for immigrants, it’s even harder.
Advocates say the incidence of domestic violence among Latinos and immigrants is about the same as for the population in general, but a host of unique obstacles increase their isolation and keep them locked in abusive relationships. Language barriers are the most obvious, but cultural barriers lead Latinas, in particular, to have a much harder time breaking the cycle of violence.

Language Barriers
Few new immigrants fully understand English. In Central Missouri, there are several domestic violence advocacy groups and shelters with staffs dedicated to helping women through the complicated process of leaving their batterers. But most organizations don’t have full-time bilingual staff members, and they rely on volunteer interpreters — a tenuous situation at best.
The same problem confronts women who dare to call the police when they feel their lives are threatened. Only a handful of law enforcement officers in the region speak Spanish fluently, and even fewer have experience working with Latin Americans.

‘The divorce doesn’t kill the marriage — the violence does.’ — Elena Morales, social worker www.adelanteonline.com

Most Missouri police departments continue to make do with high school Spanish and untrained volunteers. Sometimes, says Kansas City social worker Elena Morales, when police are called to the scene, it is often the abuser — not the victim — who speaks English, and therefore authorities hear only one side of the story.
Advocate Gail Printz in Mexico, Mo., recounts many horror stories: women who finally break through their terror to call 911 are met by a police officer who can’t understand a word of Spanish. Sometimes the police use phrase booklets to struggle through the complicated nuances of the situation, but they don’t understand. Sometimes they leave the situation worse than before, with an irate husband and a wife who sees that it’s useless to call the police.
Marshall Police Chief James Simmerman explains the department has one of the few full-time bilingual officers in rural Missouri. He says Rubén Villatoro, a Salvadorian, is the link the police department uses to reach the Latino community and teach Spanish to the rest of the staff.
But unlike some cities, Marshall doesn’t have a domestic violence unit.

Police departments vary with respect to their handling of domestic violence cases, particularly among immigrants. In some cities, police have been educated about the process and have well-established domestic violence units. In other cities, the officers know little about domestic violence or how to handle cases involving immigrants.
The Columbia Police Department’s Domestic Violence Enforcement Unit (DOVE) has been active in fighting domestic violence for five years. Detective Jeff Westerbrook of DOVE says he knows there are document issues among many Latina immigrants, but that’s not his concern.
“My concern is the violence that is going on in the relationship,” he said. “The documents are not an area that I focus on.”
Westerbrook has noticed, however, that since Sept. 11, Latinas are more reluctant to talk to the police.
Attorney General John Ashcroft is encouraging local police departments to act as immigration agents — a move that immigration advocates and even many local police departments deplore because it breaks down the trust built by community policing. In a few areas, law enforcement officers are more concerned with enforcing immigration laws than they are about ensuring immigrants’ safety.
Advocates say if women are not sure of local police department policies regarding immigration laws, it’s a good idea to contact a domestic violence advocate first and get an expert to represent them in police procedures. If there is an immediate danger, however, they recommend calling the police.
Rekha Sharma-Crawford, a former prosecuting attorney who now works in a private practice in Kansas City, sees other problems, as well. Some victims decide not to turn the abuser over to the authorities because they don’t want their abusers deported. They begin the process and decide not to press charges or testify in front of a judge, she says.

Documentation problems

Like many other immigrant women, Alicia came to this country without legal documentation. Her difficulty finding a job made her dependent on her husband. Many abusers exploit the vulnerability of their partners and threaten to turn them over to immigration officials if they try to leave or get help. Rafael was no different.
The Violence Against Women Act protects immigrant women from deportation if they cooperate in the criminal prosecution of their abusers. But few women, police or advocates know about the law.
Immigration attorney Mira Mdivani says immigrant women who are battered and who become eligible for green cards never apply for them. (see “Hope for Victims”)

Religious and cultural beliefs

Language is not the only problem they face — it’s not the only wall that keeps them in the dark. Culture and religion play huge roles in keeping abused immigrant women silent.
For many Latinas, the most important thing in life is to keep their families together. That is why “they are the ones that have to save the marriage,” Morales said. When asked what helps them survive, they typically cite their faith in God and their love for their children.
“That is also what keeps them in the abusive relationship,” Morales said.
Most of the time, their extreme isolation makes it virtually impossible for battered immigrant women to seek help. Those who are lucky enough to have relatives or friends nearby often find them to be more of a hindrance than a help because they promote the idea that a faithful wife should stay with her husband, no matter what.
Their connection with the church is essential, Morales says. Most Latinas are Catholic, and an important resource is their priest. Often women are afraid to ask the priest for help. They think he will respond as those in Latin America frequently do with an attitude like, “It’s your cross to bear,” or “Yes, we all suffer, but you will be rewarded in Heaven. Pray for him.”
“It is very important that they know how to respond when a woman tells them what they are going through,” Morales says.
A statement of the U.S. Catholic Bishops issued last November, called “When I Call for Help,” tried to address that issue on the national level. It states that, “…violence against women, inside or outside the home, is never justified. Violence in any form…is sinful; often, it is a crime as well.”
Father Michael Hermes of the trilingual St. Benedict Catholic Church in Kansas City works with Morales and other victim advocates.
“You can’t use the Bible to justify domestic violence,” Hermes says. “The church’s point of view is that you don’t have to stay in a relationship that is bad for you.”
“The divorce doesn’t kill the marriage — the violence does,” Morales emphasizes.

Breaking out

For Alicia there were many reasons why she never spoke out. The doctor’s concern was the first ray of light in her dark room.
But the walls of the darkness closed in on her again. Her husband found out about the social worker to whom the doctor had referred her. Rafael was afraid of what might happen and sent her and the children back to Mexico. Alicia didn’t know she had other options.
Initially, Rafael appeared to forget the family. Alicia learned that he had another woman, and he was beating her, too.
This other woman turned him in to the authorities, so he went back to Mexico to look for Alicia. Meanwhile, he had gotten immigration papers for the whole family and persuaded Alicia that things would be different this time.
Again, Alicia was trapped in the cycle of violence. She decided to give him another chance. She had been cleaning houses, and sometimes she didn’t have enough money to buy food for her children.
But Alicia was armed with information about resources now, and her children were pressuring her to abandon him. “Mother, let’s get out of here… We don’t want to be here with this mean old man,” they told her.
Once, Rafael disappeared for more than three days. When he came back at 2 a.m., he was drunk, and he knocked at the door expecting Alicia to be on the other side — ready and waiting. She opened the door with her son in her arms. He punched her and her lips bled. This time, she was not silent. She bit him and ran into the streets, begging the neighbors, “Help me, help me.”
Unfortunately for Alicia, her neighbors weren’t home, but her parents-in-law were. And they came to silence her screaming as they often did to keep anyone from knowing.
Her father-in-law said she was responsible for the beatings. And her mother-in-law, who had grown accustomed to beatings from her own husband, told her, “We women just have to put up with it.” They provided food for Alicia’s family, and she felt obligated to listen to them.
She was thankful for the food. But something inside her had changed. “I decided I was not going to let him kill me for a taco.”
Her newly found strength marked the beginning of the brightness.
Although she stayed with Rafael and withstood more beatings, Alicia started saving money in a teddy bear. And on Thanksgiving Day 2000, she left for California with her children. She moved from town to town and asked for help from different shelters and advocacy groups.
“We suffered a lot, but it was worth it,” affirms Alicia, who has been free from her husband for three years now, living on her own in Kansas City. “The most important thing is that we are happy and living a sane life.”

Alicia and Rafael’s names have been changed to protect their privacy, but the facts of their story are correct as reported.